Sekvantoj

Wednesday, 12 August 2009

Leicester, Belfasto kaj Strasburgo

We are getting a chief constable from Leicester, England, which, in a toss-up, is probably better than a former RUC officer (though no doubt we'll be subjected to the white man's burden/bringing civilization to the colonies approach we also got from Orde).

However, hopefully someone will ask him sharpish about his attitude to Irish speakers — Leicester of course has large ethnic minorities (in fact, they're probably ethnic majorities by now) so one hope English liberalism travels.

What we do know about Leicestershire police is that they're way behind their targets for recruiting the ethnic minorities they police (not just as unreflective as the PSNI is in mirroring the community of West Belfast, strongest Irish speaking community in the country but policed by not one single Irish speaker). Only 6 per cent of the force comes from an ethnic minority background, the target is 15 per cent.

Of course, there are other tests of the new guy's integrity: will he for example follow Orde's lead in blocking families from finding out the truth about the murder of their loved ones by the security farces?

Meanwhile, the battle to repeal the Last Penal Law — the ban on Irish in the courts — continues apace with an appeal to the Caoimhín Mac Giolla Cathain court challenge to be submitted this week. What we need is for the Brehon Law Society in the US to adopt this case — their representative Domhnall O'Cathain attended the last hearing — and to make it a cause celebre in the States.